Why Coaching?

Grieving a loss?
Feeling traumatized?
Caring for a loved one?
Living with a chronic illness?
Need a little motivation?

Let’s discuss how a life coach can help. Grief and trauma, caregiving, and living with your own chronic illness can all be serious life changing events from which recovery is often difficult. Losing a part of yourself due to one of these events can be devastating. Coaching can help you deal with the challenges you face and find ways to recover your quality of life and to live well again. Walking through the pain takes courage and determination and the journey is one with many ups and downs. I will be with you along the way to encourage and motivate you.

Coaching is not the same as therapy. In coaching you will set short term goals that will guide you toward the main goal of finding quality in your life again, to discover your potential to unleash your inner strength, and to learn to give yourself permission to focus forward.

Why me? I have been there. I have grieved. I have cared for a loved one. I have received care from loved ones. I have lived with a chronic illness for many years. I have faced death.

I have learned to thrive despite these life-altering issues and to turn them around to see them as challenges to be met and not complications to be feared.

I have led groups for caregivers for many years and have coached office staff in two different businesses when a co-worker has tragically died. I have helped care for my dad who died of Alzheimer’s, and I have received a kidney transplant.

My name is Mary Kathryn Marcom, and I’d love to hear from you. Click here to schedule a complimentary 30-minute phone call to find out more about what I can offer you as your coach.

Services

All coaching offered worldwide by phone, online by video or audio

Also offered in person in the San Francisco Bay Area only

Offered for your community, workplace, or nonprofit organization at a reduced rate

Grief and Trauma Coaching
Usually one hour sessions

Caregiver Support Coaching
½ or 1 hour sessions

Living Well (with a Chronic or Acute Illness) Coaching
½ or 1 hour sessions

Motivational Speaking
Speaking with organizations or groups and tailored to the audience being addressed
Audience participation encouraged

Workshops and presentations include
Caregiving support and caring for the caregiver
Searching for normalcy after grief
After the diagnosis of chronic or acute illness – What’s next?

Contact me for a complimentary 30 minute session to inquire about motivational speaking, coaching, or presentations.

About

I’m Mary Kathryn, and I love how coaching changes the lives of other people.

I’ve been there.

The suicide of a very close cousin first put me on a path to dealing with grief. With his death, I spiraled into a deep depression and had to face past grief and trauma issues of my own. I began to understand the impact on me of the behavior of my grandfather, who traumatized me when I was a small child by sexually abusing me, and father, who suffered from alcoholism and bipolar disorder.

I never thought I could get better, but I walked through the pain with the help of others, and now I’m walking through that pain with others by coaching them.

I was diagnosed with renal failure at the age of 27, due to an alcoholic doctor not checking my medication levels, and I thought my life was over. I almost died once from a kidney biopsy in which medical mistakes were made and nearly died a second time from a severe case of cytomegalovirus. At 38, I was diagnosed with M.S. and was in a wheelchair for several years, and still have side effects. I received a kidney transplant in 2011, yet I now deal with the slow chronic renal failure from that kidney, the severe anemia that goes with chronic disease, and can eat very little solid food because of three more surgeries after the transplant to help my kidney drain, resulting in large amounts of scar tissue. Yet I live each day to the fullest and encourage others with chronic illnesses to find joy in what they do.

I’ve both had a caregiver and been a caregiver, I’ve led Caregiver Support groups for several years, and I understand well the mixture of emotions that being a caregiver entails…pain, joy, anger, peace, forgiveness, resentment, exhaustion, rest, questioning.
I’ve lived your feelings and had your thoughts. I’ve struggled and overcome.

I give presentations, workshops, lead groups, and do motivational speaking to share how to thrive in these tough situations.

If you can relate at all, then I’m the coach and the speaker you want.

I recently moved to the San Francisco Bay Area from Little Rock, Arkansas, where I previously started coaching in 2013 through my business, Life Coach Arkansas, did motivational speaking and presentations, and worked as a part-time administrative assistant at First United Methodist Church in Maumelle, Ark. I now do coaching work in the Bay Area as a Grief/Trauma Coach, Living Well with Chronic illness Coach, and a Motivational Speaker. In addition, I work part time at Christ Presbyterian Church in Terra Linda, located in San Rafael.

A graduate of The Hutchison School and Arkansas State University (social work major), I also studied at Bowdoin College in Maine and Iliff Theological School in Colorado. I was licensed as a Realtor for several years and also as a social worker in the state of Arkansas.

I have led Caregiver Groups for many years and done hospital visits for my church. I am certified as a Congregational Care Minister and am also certified by the Professional Administrators of the United Methodist Connectional Structure (PAUMCS) as a church administrator.

I now attend First Presbyterian Church in San Anselmo, CA, am an active member of PEO (a philanthropic organization), love spending time with my two small dogs, and enjoy the many cultural activities the Bay Area offers.

I realize the importance of having a positive attitude each day and being joyful and loving to myself and to others. I know that not dealing with past or present issues prevents people from following their dreams or reaching their potential.

I am certified as a coach through the CASE Institute, have a certification as a Joy Restoration (Grief) Coach and as a Relationship Specialist through the Professional Christian Coaching & Counseling Academy, and am currently enrolled as a student in the International Coaching Academy, working to be certified as a coach through the International Coaching Federation, the most internationally recognized certification for Coaches. I expect to be fully certified as an ICF Coach before the end of 2018.

Blog

I recently had a call from a client about a friend of hers who is struggling with a serious chronic illness, and she didn’t know what to say or how to be with her. Have you ever felt like my client? If so, just remember IT’S NOT ABOUT YOU and your comfort level. It’s about …

Monday, January 21, is a holiday, and many people in the country will have the day off. However, it’s not simply a day off, as holidays so often are approached, just as July 4 and Memorial Day aren’t simply days off. There is much more to these holidays and so often the reason for the …

Late this afternoon, I took my almost 13 year-old Maltipoo to be put down. As she lay on the table at the vet clinic, I began thinking of all the labels she has had over the years. “Young geriatric” is a label she was given at two years old, because she was always like an …